Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT_ZIP/spacedig/V13_2/V13_288.ZIP/V13_288

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Subject: SPACE Digest V13 #288

SPACE Digest                                     Volume 13 : Issue 288

Today's Topics:
     MAJOR SOLAR FLARE ALERT - HIGH IMPACT EXPECTED FOR 16 MARCH
         Re: railguns and electro-magnetic launchers
              CFV:  sci.geo.meteorology
              looking for a NASA report
        Re: Value per pound vs. cost per pound
       Re: Saturn V (was: space news from Jan 28 AW&ST

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----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 14 Mar 91 05:26:00 GMT
From: agate!linus!philabs!ttidca!quad1!bohica!mcws!p0.f851.n102.z1.fidonet.org![e-mail]  (CARY OLER)
Subject: MAJOR SOLAR FLARE ALERT - HIGH IMPACT EXPECTED FOR 16 MARCH

From: [e-mail] (CARY OLER)
Path: wciu!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!HG.ULeth.CA!oler
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: MAJOR SOLAR FLARE ALERT - HIGH IMPACT EXPECTED FOR 16 MARCH
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 13 Mar 91 21:26:24 GMT

                        --  MAJOR SOLAR FLARE ALERT  --

                                MARCH 13, 1991
                                   Alert #2

                              Flare Event Summary
               ** POTENTIALLY HIGH TERRESTRIAL IMPACTS EXPECTED **


                                    --------



MAJOR ENERGETIC EVENT SUMMARY

     Two additional major solar flares have occurred over the past 24 hours.
The first major event was rated a class X1.3/2B and seems to have been
associated with a Type IV sweep.  Several Type IV sweeps have been observed
recently.  The event began at 08:00 UT, peaked at 08:08 UT and ended at 08:13
UT.  The flare was located within Region 6545 near S10E45 (unofficial).  The
flare was associated with a strong 1300 s.f.u. Tenflare at 08:02 UT.

     The second major flare erupted at 15:42 UT, peaked at 15:48 UT and
ended at 16:02 UT.  This event was rated a class X3.9/1N.  A strong
Tenflare of 3600 s.f.u. was also observed with this flare.

     Satellite protons increased to near event thresholds recently.  The
peak proton count reached 9 p.f.u. (10 is the event level).  It has since
declined and is presently holding at near 4 p.f.u..

     Region 6545 is a potent region containing large sunspots in close
proximity to one another.  Magnetic fields are high and gradients are
strong.  This region will continue to produce major solar flares of class X
or M intensities.  Protons could easily surpass event thresholds if flaring
continues.

     Region 6538 continues to remain fairly dormant in flare output, but
contains all of the ingredients necessary to begin major flaring again.  It
is expected to begin to produce at least M-class flares anytime now.


POTENTIAL TERRESTRIAL IMPACT FORECAST

     A POTENTIALLY HIGH TERRESTRIAL IMPACT IS BEING FORECASTED FOR 15, 16
AND POSSIBLY 17 MARCH!

     A MAJOR GEOMAGNETIC AND AURORAL STORM is possible on 15 and/or 16 March.
Data obtained from Pioneer Venus show that the solar wind velocity has
increased dramatically to values near 970 km/s with a strongly directed
southward magnetic component.  It is possible that the earth could be hit
with some of the material streaming by this satellite.  Current predictions
estimate that the geomagnetic storming could push the A-index to levels
near 50 on 16 March.  Middle latitude magnetic K-indices are expected to
be sustained near 5 and 6 with possible brief periods near 7 (if activity
is more intense than expected).  High latitude magnetic activity could
surpass A-indices of 100 with associated K-index values between 7 and 9 (it
should be noted that a K-index of 9 is the top of the scale).  Magnetic
perturbations over high latitudes could approach 1,500 to 2,000 gammas.
Middle latitudes could see fluctuations between 100 and 250 gammas (for
mid to southerly middle latitudes).  Northerly middle latitudes could see
fluctuations ranging from 200 to 1000 gammas.

     A MAJOR geomagnetic storm is possible.  Storming is expected to peak
on 16 March.  A sudden storm commencement associated with the arrival of
the interplanetary shockwave is expected sometime on 15 March.  It is
difficult to determine when this shock might hit, but preliminary estimates
suggest that the shock could arrive near 12:00 UT on 15 March.  Minor to major
geomagnetic storming could follow shortly thereafter.

     A POTENTIAL LOW LATITUDE AURORAL ACTIVITY WARNING is being issued for
16 March.  Auroral activity could become visible at southerly middle and some
low latitude regions if storming reaches or exceeds predicted levels.  High
latitude and northerly middle latitudes could experience auroral storming
with possible high auroral activity.

     Significant VHF auroral backscatter will be possible late on 15
and on 16 March.  HF conditions are expected to be quite disturbed on 16
March.  Significant fading, flutter, noise and absorption are possible.  If
storming occurs, MUF's will decrease and LUF's will increase notably.
Updates and/or modifications to this forecast will be posted when available.

     Major flaring is expected to continue.  Proton and/or PCA activity
could occur anytime.  Watch for possible future warnings and/or alerts.

**  End of Alert  **


--
: CARY OLER - via FidoNet node 1:102/851 [phone]
: ARPA/INTERNET: [e-mail]
: UUCP: ...!{elroy!bohica,elroy!wciu,cit-vax!wciu}!mcws!851.0!CARY.OLER
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------------------------------

Date: 20 Mar 91 01:38:58 GMT
From: swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!samsung!know!news.cs.indiana.edu!ariel.unm.edu!triton.unm.edu![e-mail]  (John Prentice)
Subject: Re: railguns and electro-magnetic launchers

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Henry Spencer) writes:
>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (John Prentice) writes:
>>I thought the real problem was surviving the initial acceleration...
>>... Has anyone ever attempted to
>>launch a payload out of a EM launcher that is at all complicated, in the
>>sense of having telemetry, etc... ?
>
>Nobody's done this with an EM launcher.  However, it has been done many
>times with old-fashioned chemical guns, starting with radar proximity
>fuzes in WW2 and progressing to upper-atmosphere research instruments in
>the 1960s with Project HARP.
>

The two are not comparable however.  EM launchers involve accelerations
many orders of magnitude larger than chemical guns (or even light gas
guns).  I have seen some railguns push 100 g's in weapons tests.  That
makes it alot harder to design the payload.  I don't know what accelerations
are contemplated for EM launchers for putting a payload into space, but
I would have to assume they are not significantly smaller.  Does anyone
know what accelerations are involved?

John

--
John K. Prentice    [e-mail] (Internet)
Dept. of Physics and Astronomy, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM, USA
Computational Physics Group, Amparo Corporation, Albuquerque, NM, USA

------------------------------

Date: 18 Mar 91 03:46:02 GMT
From: sdd.hp.com!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!rpi![e-mail]  (Jason J. Levit)
Subject: CFV:  sci.geo.meteorology

After some dicussion and many people urging me to put this to a vote,
I hereby call for the vote on the newsgroup sci.geo.meteorology.
Once again, here is the charter:

NAME: sci.geo.meteorology

CHARTER: Discussion of meteorology and related topics.

MODERATION STATUS: Unmoderated

PURPOSE AND JUSTIFICATION: Our lives are effected daily by the
weather.  However, this is not new news.  In the past few years,
meteorology has fast become a cutting-edge science.  Scientists are
now optimizing the way forecasts are made; supercomputers are studying
chaos theory and its relation to the atmosphere; fascinating research
is taking place on severe weather and tornados, with research on new
types of radar; microbursts and wind shear are being studied heavily;
of course global warming, hurricane research, lightning...the list
goes on and on.

I believe interesting discussion could take place in this newsgroup.
It would be a benefit to professionals in the field, students, and the
general public by the exchange of information on the various topics of
the atmosphere.

*********************** VOTING PROCEDURE ****************************

Please vote in this format:

If you wish to vote yes, send a message to:
[e-mail], with a "I vote YES" in the subject line
and a "I vote YES for sci.geo.meteorology." in the contents of the
letter.

If you wish to vote no, send a message to: [e-mail],
with a "I vote NO" in the subject line and a "I vote NO for
sci.geo.meteorology" in the contents of the letter.

Any other messages that clearly state a vote for one way or the other
will be counted.

Any comments or questions can be sent to me, Jason J. Levit,
[e-mail].

The voting period will last from March 18th, 1991 through April 13th,
1991 (27 days).  Any votes received before or after this period will
not be counted.

As always, this group must receive 100 more YES votes than NO votes
and the YES votes must be 2/3 of the majority.

I will have at least one mass acknowledgement during the voting period.

--
Jason J. Levit       Tornado Chaser Extraordinaire       [e-mail]
  Boing...boing...boing...boing...listen to all that bouncing mail out there!
         A good planet is hard to find; let's save this one!

------------------------------

Date: 12 Mar 91 01:51:00 GMT
From: sdd.hp.com!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!think.com!linus!philabs!ttidca!quad1!bohica!mcws!p0.f851.n102.z1.fidonet.org![e-mail]  (James D Mooney)
Subject: looking for a NASA report

From: [e-mail] (James D Mooney)
Path: wciu!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!linac!uwm.edu!bionet!ames!haven!cs.wvu.wvnet.edu!jdm
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: looking for a NASA report
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 11 Mar 91 17:51:36 GMT
(I am posting this query for my 10th grade daughter):

I've been referred to a study identifying the economic benefits of NASA
technology Spinoffs for a research project I am conducting on these
benefits.  I understand that the NASA Scientific and Technical Information
Facility in Baltimore has copies of this study, and I wrote to them several
weeks ago.  I have gotten no response.  I need a copy of this study as soon
as possible, and any shortcuts you may know of in getting a hold of one
would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks.

                    Tara Mooney

--
Jim Mooney                Dept. of Stat. & Computer Science
[phone]                West Virginia University
                    Morgantown, WV 26506
INTERNET: [e-mail]


--
: James D Mooney - via FidoNet node 1:102/851 [phone]
: ARPA/INTERNET: [e-mail]
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------------------------------

Date: 11 Mar 91 10:28:00 GMT
From: agate!linus!philabs!ttidca!quad1!bohica!mcws!p0.f851.n102.z1.fidonet.org![e-mail]  (Nick Szabo)
Subject: Re: Value per pound vs. cost per pound

From: [e-mail] (Nick Szabo)
Path: wciu!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!usc!samsung!uunet!zephyr.ens.tek.com!tektronix!sequent!crg5!szabo
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Value per pound vs. cost per pound
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 11 Mar 91 02:28:16 GMT
In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Glenn A. Serre) writes:

>Nick:
>Name _one_ industry that successfully handles large, fragile,
>fuel-filled, use-once-and-throw-away objects at low costs.
>The military is the major field that does this, and the costs are
>not low.
>Me:
>The ELV industry?  ELVs aren't all that fragile, they don't get handled when
>their filled with fuel, and handling doesn't cost much time or money.

The original issue was, can chemical launch costs ever be significantly
lower than present, and if so, by how much?  Note that we need a factor of
10,000 drop to make manned flights to the Moon as economical as
a round trip to Tokyo.  This would be a change similar to going down
to the local Honda dealer and buying an Accord for a dollar bill and
change.

The point is, the ELV is _not_ low cost (at least not nearly as low cost
as we'd like it to be).  In large part, because of these characterestics
unique to and inherent in chemical rockets.

Commercial aircraft, for example, carry much less fuel per pound of
payload, travel much slower, and yet cost $millions to $hundreds of
millions apeice (compensated by reusing them 1000's of times).  It
seems both chemical airplanes and chemical rockets have flattened
out as far as cost/lb. is concerned.

Other factors, such as value/lb. and entry level costs can still be
dramatically improved, as demonstrated by Pegasus.  And of course,
there are many non-chemical-rocket options (gas gun, EML, laser
launch, tethers, etc.) that we should be working on.


>Customers do say:
>We want %100 reliability.

No, customers want a reliability level within the reasonable range
for a transportation system.  90-95% would be fine for freight, for
starters.  If you look at insurance rates, or work out customer costs
without insurance, you will see why.

>We want %100 launch availability

No, customers want availability within the reasonable range for a
transportation system, ie within minutes to weeks instead of delays
of months or years.  This is another strength of Pegasus -- it is the
first space transportation system that starts to understand what
transportation is all about.

>We want everything cleaned to clean room standards.

Since launch costs are otherwise so high, customers need to maximize
the capability of the payload.  Bring down the costs in other ways,
so payload value/mass ratio is not so important, and we can get rid
of the cleanroom.  This is not chicken/egg, since the cleanroom is only
a small part of the costs.

>We want to launch on need.

See comment on "100% launch availability".

>We want custom interfaces.

No, rocket makers want to make custom rockets with custom interfaces,
rather than building to fit existing payloads.  Actually, the fault lies
with both sides, and is well worth working on (cf. my "rocket clone" proposal).

>Etc. etc.
>Essentially, they _want_ to pay $5,000/lb

Essentially, space transportation customers want what every other
transportation customer wants (surprise!).  Chemical rockets seem
to be only capable of meeting these needs at a rate over
$5,000/lb.


--
Nick Szabo            [e-mail]
"What are the _facts_, and to how many decimal places?"  -- RAH


--
: Nick Szabo - via FidoNet node 1:102/851 [phone]
: ARPA/INTERNET: [e-mail]
: UUCP: ...!{elroy!bohica,elroy!wciu,cit-vax!wciu}!mcws!851.0!Nick.Szabo
: Compu$erve: >internet:[e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 13 Mar 91 23:01:00 GMT
From: agate!linus!philabs!ttidca!quad1!bohica!mcws!p0.f851.n102.z1.fidonet.org![e-mail]  (Michael L. Cook)
Subject: Re: Saturn V (was: space news from Jan 28 AW&ST

From: [e-mail] (Michael L. Cook)
Path: wciu!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!maverick.ksu.ksu.edu!zoot.avgrp.cr.rok.com!aten.cca.rok.com!mlc
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Saturn V (was: space news from Jan 28 AW&ST
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 13 Mar 91 15:01:07 GMT
In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (John A. Weeks III) writes:

|>the Saturn V must have been the result of a team of engineers, and was tested
|>and retested innumeral times.  All without the benefit of modern
supercomputers,
|>or even the luxury of a hand calculator.
|>
|>It amazes me that the Saturn V was possible at all, let alone 25 years ago.
|>
|>I wouldn't mind seeing the Saturn V fly again, but I would like to think that
|>we (humans, including those north of the boarder) could do better.

World Wide News should jump on this.  The Saturn V was built for us by
space aliens!!   They knew we could not do it ourselves.  This would explain
all those missing documents, specs, blueprints, etc. making it impossible
for us to build one now.

Michael Cook
Internet: [e-mail]
"Post no bills"


--
: Michael L. Cook - via FidoNet node 1:102/851 [phone]
: ARPA/INTERNET: [e-mail]
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------------------------------

End of SPACE Digest V13 #288
*******************